Thea had a few friends over for a little birthday tea. Her cake of choice, as always with my children, was chocolate.

I love this chocolate cake recipe. I got it from my Aunt, who got it from Granny. It is the perfect cake for parties, celebrations or just for a good chocolate fix.

I decorated the cake using two packets of chocolate fingers and a couple of tubes of smarties poured over the top. For a more sophisticated look you could use chocolate cigarellos around the cake and fill it with raspberries and serve with cream!

How you make the cake will now vary depending on whether you have a food processor

FOOD PROCESSOR: Place all the ingredients into a food processor and mix together until smooth

BOWL: Mix all the dry ingredients into a bowl together, mix all the wet indents in a jug. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and mix until smooth.

Divide the mixture between the two tins and bake in the oven for about half an hour. When cooked the top of the cake should spring back when you press it gently. To double check, when you think it is done pop a sharp knife into the middle of the cake, if it comes out clean then the cake is cooked. If it comes out with cake mixture on it put it back in for a couple more minutes.

Remove the cakes from the oven and allow to cool for five minutes, remove from tins and place on rack (if you don’t have one leave on clean side to cool.

As the cake cools make the icing, i make mine in the food processor. Place all the ingredients in the food processor and blitz till smooth, you may need to add a little bit more milk if you want the icing a little thinner. If you don’t have a food processor, place all ingredients in bowl and mix by hand.

Once cake is cool ice the middle, sandwich the two cakes together and then ice all around it

I store this cake in the fridge, remove 20 minutes before you serve to allow the icing to relax slightly.

Cooking notes

All the teaspoon and tablespoon measurements in the recipe need to be level. You need to use a good quality strong coco powder to give the cake a real chocolate kick. If the icing is not stroung enough then use more coco.

Adapting

I use butter icing on this as i think it makes it wonderfully rich, if you would prefer not to then follow the instructions on the side of the icing packet for the other icing options.

The last few months have been pretty busy. Three months of builders, dust and countless decisions meant that I did not spend as long in the kitchen as I would have liked.

With the builders gone I have been really enjoying trying new recipes and keeping one of my new years resolutions: to make rather than buy more of our families biscuits and cakes. My resolution was inspired by a terrifying programme I watched that explained what is actually in our food. I imagine it is a question many of us have asked ourselves since "horse meat gate".

I thought if I started with cakes and biscuits I was doing pretty well ... however one of the images that really stood out for me was bread being injected with all sorts of preservatives.

After reading about the changes in bread making since 1961 when the Chorleywood Processwas developed I decided I needed to buy better bread ... and learn how to make it.

I found Vanessa Kimbell who runs the Juniper and Rose Kitchen Garden School. She does all sorts of wonderful courses. I signed up and went along to her Sourdough class.

I had a great day. Vanessa not only runs great courses, that I can not recommend highly enough, but creates a very welcoming environment by running the courses from her kitchen.

As you walk up to the house, through her much loved garden, you are greeted by two well behaved dogs. You arrive at the front door and get a glimpse of the chickens on the other side of the lawn before being ushered through into the kitchen for a cup of tea. You can see the herb garden is taking shape out of the kitchen window and you feel immediately at home.

We were soon all up to are arms in flour making Sourdough and disscussing all sorts of interesting ingredients and our reasons for doing the course. We stopped mid morning for tea and muffins, followed by a delicious carrot soup and Vanessa’s bread for lunch.

In the afternoon my eyes were opened to a whole host of delicious food you can make with sourdough. We made grissini, pizza, focaccia, mini blue cheese and rosemary canapés ... to name a few.

The course had the perfect balance between theory and practice and left me dying to get back to my kitchen ... My first attempt came out of the oven last night ... here is a photo:

Apparently it will take seven loafs before I get a real grasp on baking sourdough ... so I am not going to attempt to give you the recipe.

Instead, I am going to give you my recipe for Jerusalem Artichoke Soup. I made it yesturday and we ate it with the remains of my sourdough loaf and some savory muffins ... I was inspired by the muffins we had on the course so when I came across Vanessa's Caraway & Parmesan Muffin recipe I could not resist giving them ago.

If you are learning to bake or have any views on the Chorlywood Process I would love to hear them ... you can comment below or send me an email.

I realised this morning that I wrote my first post STEAK SALADa year ago today. I can not believe it has been that long, it has gone really quickly ... I have really enjoyed writing recipes, photographing food and meeting lots of other like minded people who love to gather around their tables and enjoy food with their friends and family.

As I have a few more readers than this time last year ... when it was just my wonderful husband under duress ... I thought I would repost the delicious salad that Emily, Jack, Rich and I enjoyed a year ago ...

Cut up the butternut squash into 16 or so pieces. I do it by cutting of the ends of the butternut squash then cutting it in half, lenghtways. Remove the seeds and cut in half the other way so you are left with four pieces of squash, two semi circles and two long pieces. Cut each of these into four, lenghways and place in roasting tray. Drizzle the squash with olive oil and put in oven for 30-40 minutes until cooked, should be soft and lightly golden. Take out of the oven and leave to cool slightly while you prepare the salad.

Steam the asparagus for 1-2 mins till cooked (the time will vary with size of asparagus). Once cooked drain and run some cold water over them to stop them cooking. Shake of water and put to side.

Place a dry frying pan on the heat and add 50g of flaked almonds, keep stirring till they start to colour, once they do, add a teaspoon of sugar to the pan and stir. The sugar will melt and coat the almonds. Once all the almonds are coated, place them on a plate, if you leave them in frying pan they will keep cooking and burn.

Rinse frying pan and pop back on heat with a tablespoon of butter, once the butter is bubbling add steak to pan. The steak I buy is 1.5cm thick. Cook it for a minute and a half on each side for medium rare and remove from heat, leave the meat to rest in warm place for a few minutes.

Place the salad leaves in a large bowl or on a plate, pour over half the dressing and mix well to ensure all the leaves are covered. Place the butternut squash and asparagus in another bowl and pour over the rest of the dressing, gently mix to cover all the vegtables and place the dressed butternut squash and asparagus over the salad leaves. Crumble over blue cheese (if using) and sprinkle with half the flaked almonds.

Slice the steak into strips and place on top of salad with any juices. Sprinkle on the rest of the almonds, drizzle the dish with olive oil and serve.

Cooking Notes

If you are not a blue cheese fan or what a slightly lighter dish then leave it out. If you like your steak done rare, cook it for a minute on each side. For Medium do two mintues. If your steak is a little thinner you will need to adjust cooking times accordingly.

I adore Florentines, they are a favourite of mine and have been since I was a little girl. It was always such a treat to open a box. I loved tearing thrugh the silver foil handing them round and decideding which flavour chocolate to chose, white, dark or milk?

This week I made a couple of batches. They went down very well served after cheese at an impromptu dinner party.

Line a baking tray with baking paper and brush lightly with vegetable oil

Place a small bowl of cold water next to you

Place the egg whites, icing sugar, almonds, mixed peel and cherries into a bowl and mix gently together

Dip you hands in the bowl of water then pick up a heaped tablespoon size of the mix and place it on the baking paper. Use a fork to spread out the little mound of mixture, I find they spread to about 6-8cm in diameter. You want to make them as thin as possible without creating to many gaps between the almond flakes.

Place the florentines in the oven and bake for about 12 minutes until the biscuits are golden brown. Check underneath one biscuit to make sure they are cooked through.

Allow to cool then gently, using a palette knife, remove the biscuits from the baking paper and serve.

Cooking notes

I use a round silver biscuit cutter that is about 6cm in diameter and spread my mixture inside it to create a circle of almonds.

I quite like these without chocolate. If you want to cover the bottom of them in chocolate melt 200g and use a brush to spread it on the florentine. Pop them in the fridge to allow the chocolate to harden before serving, this takes about an hour. I melt my chocolate by using two heatproof bowls that fit inside each other. Fill the large with a little boiling water, break up the chocolate into small pieces and place in the small bowl. Pop the small bowl into the big bowl of water and cover both bowls with tin foil. Leave them for 5-10 minutes until melted. I normally do 100g of choclate at a time.

Store the florentines in an airtight container, they should last for 3-4 days

Adapting

I adapted this from Ottolenghi’s Orange an Almond recipe. If you don’t like the fruit in the florentines then remove it and use a total of 260g of almonds and the grated zest of 1 orange instead of the fruit.

Roast Chicken is one of my ultimate comfort foods. If I am dithering over what to cook, not feeling a hundred percent, have people popping over last min ... I turn to roast chicken.

Due to the amount of times it has turned up on our kitchen table I have come up with a number of quick and simple sides. One delicious recipe that regularly features in our house is Harissa Potatoes ... bring them, the chicken and a bowl of lettuce leaves to the table and you have a delicious simple meal in no time ...

Slice the peppers into long thin strips, they should be about half a cm wide. Place the strips on a baking tray, drizzle with olive oil and pop in the oven for 25-30 minutes until soft and starting to brown slightly. Turn the peppers every ten minutes so they cook evenly.

While the peppers are cooking, wash the potatoes and place in a saucepan full of cold water. All the potatoes should be about the same size so they cook equally so cut an large ones in half or thirds as needed

Boil the potatoes for 10-15 minutes until cooked, the drain them

Place the potatoes in a bowl, drizzle with olive oil and add the harissa paste and the peppers, mix throughly and serve

Cooking notes

The cooking time of the potatoes is a guide as it can vary enormously due to the size of your potatoes.

I buy my harissa paste from le pain quotidien as it tastes wonderful. You can also find it in most good supermarkets. If you like your potatoes a little more spicy add in some more paste.

Adapting

If you don’t have any salad in the house chop up a large handful of parsley and add it to the potates and serve on its own with the chicken.

I was lucky enough to grow up in Aldeburgh, a small seaside town in suffolk. This weekend was the Aldeburgh Carnival.

The weekend is full of old fashioned fun activities: swimming races in the sea, children's running races, mini marathon, the carnival procession, it is great fun.

The events culminate on Monday evening with the lantern procession, which is my favourite part of the weekend.

A few thousand people gather in the high street, holding chinese lanterns, there is a sea of colourful bobbing candle lights, it is simply stunning and so magical.

The crowd of lanterns walk down the high street and then spread on to the beach to watch the fireworks. Before, during and after the display people send floating lanterns up into the sky so there are glowing lights all over the place. Looking on in wonder our two year old son said ‘Mummy can we stay forever’.

Thea made us all laugh at the end of the display be shouting ‘Thank you fairies’ ... she is convinced that they make the fireworks with their fairy dust! It really took me back to all the years we sat on the beach as children.

This year, for the first time in a while, lots of my childhood friends have come back with their children to enjoy the magic ... to celebrate we had a dinner party for twelve on Sunday. I cooked this wonderful cake for pudding.

I would really recomend trying it ... as with all Ottolenghi recipes it is wondeful. Do pop a comment below if you do make it as I would love to know how you got on. Also please give details of any wonderful events that you are taking part in this summer ... or took part in when you were children.

Preheat your oven to 170°C. Grease a 20cm springform cake tin and line the base and sides with baking parchment.

Place the butter and both types of chocolate in a vary large heatproof bowl - it should be big enough to accommodate the entire mix. Put the brown sugar and water in a small saucepan, stir to mix, then bring to the boil over a medium heat. Pour the boiling syrup over the butter and chocolate and stir well until they are melted and you are left with a runny chocolate sauce. Stir in the egg yolks, one at a time. Set aside until the mixture comes to room temperature.

Put the egg whites and salt in a large bowl and whisk to a firm, but not o dry meringue. Using a rubber spatula or large metal spoon, gently fold the meringue into the cooled chocolate mixture a third at a time. The whites should be fully incorporated but there is no harm if you can see small bits of meringue in the mix.

Pour 800g (two thirds) of the mixture into the prepared cake tin and level gently with a palate knife. Leave the rest of the batter for later. Place the cake in the oven for 35-40 minutes, until a skewer comes out almost clean. Remove from the oven and lave to cool completely.

Flatten the top of the cake with a palette knife. Don’t worry about breaking the crust. Pour the rest of the batter on top and level the surface again. Return to the oven and bake for 20-25 minutes. Thea cake should still have moist crumbs when checked with a skewer. Lave to cool completely before removing from the tin. Dust with coco powder and serve

Cooking notes

When you pour the hot sugar over the chocolate I found that the sugar did not completely dissolve, it went slightly grainy until I added the yolks and gave it a good beat. This sorted it self out in the cooking so don’t panic!

The cake will keep covered, at room temperature for 4 days.

The recipe states that this will feed 6-8 ... it is so rich that it stretched to 12 very happily.

Adapting

I love cold chocolate so I placed the cake in the fridge after it had cooled ... it was delicious.

Break a quails egg into each of the croustades, I tend to use a knife or the sharp edge of a saucepan to do this

Place the baking tray with the eggs on it into the oven for 4-5 minutes, you want them to have just cooked with the yoke still slightly runny

While the eggs are cooking use a pair of scissors to finely chop up the chives and heat up your hollandaise

Remove the eggs from the oven and place on a plate. Blob on a 1/4 of a teaspoon of hollandaise sauce and sprinkle with chives ... serve while hot

Cooking notes

Breaking the quails eggs is a fairly fiddly job. I normally do it about ten minutes before my guests are due to arrive. Occasionally you get little bits of egg shell in the croustade. I find the best way to get these out is to dip the broken shell in and scoop them out.

As every oven is a slightly different temperature I recommend keeping an eye on the eggs while they are cooking. I find they take 4-5 minutes in my oven. If you over cook them and they are not runny don't worry they will still taste great. If after five minutes they are still transparent and undercooked then cook them for longer.

I use Nick Nairn's wonderfully quick recipe for my hollandaise (see below). If you do not have time to make it then buy it ... I would recommend buying fresh hollandaise from the fridge, rather than a long life jar, waitrose do a good one.

Hollandaise Sauce - Serves 4

2 egg yolks, 250g hot butter, juice 1 small lemon, salt and pepper

Melt your butter in a saucepan

Place boiling water in a glass bowl, to heat up the bowl

Put the egg yolks and 2 tablespoons of boiling water into a food processor with the cutting blade in it and blitz till fluffy, should take 30 seconds

Once the eggs are fluffy, take off the small removable lid on the funnle of the food processor and slowly pour the melted butter through the funnel while it is still running (take care that it does not spit). This should take about 15-20 seconds.

Once you have poured the butter through add in the lemon juice and whizz for a few more seconds till the sauce thickens.

Once thick pour out the water from the glass bowl, dry quickly and pour in the Hollandaise sauce

Season with salt and pepper, cover and put in a warm place until needed ... the sauce should keep like this for an hour.

Cooking notes

If you use a large lemon for this use half the juice otherwise it will be very citrusy.

July was a scary month for us. Our four year old was in hospital with suspected encephalitis ... She started hallucinating so we rushed her to the Chelsea and Westminster where she was put on intravenous antibiotics for five days.

Having never spent a night in hospital my eyes were opened to the NHS. The doctors and nurses gave our daughter wonderful care. Nothing was too much trouble day or night. They worked long shifts dealing with not just sick children but also worried parents. We left with a real sense of admiration for all the staff on Neptune ward. A big thank you to you all.

After five days of fairly bland hospital food Thea and I were both very keen for some home cooking ... as we got in the car, Thea asked for duck breast with asparagus ... she was definitely feeling better! Over the next few days we ate both of her requests as well as a lot of other fruit and veg as we got her strength back up.

Last week we thought a family outing was needed. We popped up to Westbourne Grove and spent the morning showing the children all the wonderful produce and playing ‘name the vegetable’ in Daylesford Organic. We popped into Melt (a wonderful chocolate shop) and watched the chocolatier creating stunning treats and finished by having lunch in one of our favourite places ... Ottolenghi.

If you have not been I urge you to. It is wonderful. The window is piled high with the most beautiful cakes and meringues. As you walk past the cakes you see the savoury food ... enormous white dishes are filled with the most stunning food. Butternut squash, herbs, aubergine, nuts, beef ... it is quite simply ... food heaven.

We had a delicious meal and Thea has not stopped asking to go back. We are now on holiday and I packed ‘Ottolenghi the Cookbook’ so we could enjoy more wonderful flavours while we are away.

Yesterday we had a shoulder of lamb and I cooked the following sweet potato dish. It was delicious and so wonderful to sit round a table with two healthy children. As we raised our glasses I said a little thank you to all those who helped her get better ...

OTTOLENGHI’S ROAST SWEET POTATO WITH PECAN AND MAPLE - Serves 4-6 as a side

Do not peel the sweet potatoes. Cut of and discard the ends of the sweet potato and then slice the remaining into 2cm rounds and place into a baking tray.

Drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper and mix with your hands. Once all the sweet potato is covered spread them out on the baking tray, the sweet potato rounds should not be touching.

Pop them in the oven for 30 minutes until just tender. Turn them over gently half way through cooking.

Place the pecans in a frying pan and on a low heat gently toast them. Stir them every ten second or so with a wooden spoon ... it should take a couple of minutes to toast them. Remove them from the pan and place on a dry chopping board to cool. Once cool roughly chop them.

To make the dressing, place all the ingredients in a small bowl with some salt and pepper and mix together. Taste and adjust the seasoning

When the potatoes are ready transfer them into a large bowl or plate with high sides. Allow to cool for a couple of minutes while you cut up the herbs. Add the spring onions, parsley, coriander, chilli, pecans and sultanas and then pour over the dressing. Toss the ingredients together gently to combine all the flavours. Season to taste and serve hot or at room temperature.

Cooking notes

Take care not to over cook the sweet potato, they need to be just tender. If you cook them too much they will go mushy and fall apart when you add the other ingredients.

The pecans need to be hot in the pan for about a minute any longer and they will burn. Once cooked remove them from the frying pan or they will continue to cook and may burn. If you are not sure about cooking them in a frying pan you can cook them in the oven. Place on a baking tray and pop in at 190 for 4-5 minutes.

If your sultanas are a little hard (it sometimes happens if they have been sitting in the back of your cupboard for a while) then pop them in a bowl of hot water for 5 minutes. Drain and dry before adding to the salad.

Adapting

If you are not sure about any of the ingredients do substitute them ... I would recommend trying it as written above first and then adapting if you want to. I was not sure about the sultanas ... but they work really well.

I have just read ‘The Busy Trap’ an interesting article which discusses how busy our lives have become.

Living in London with two small children their are times where I feel that my feet don’t touch the ground. Reading the article reminded me that much of our busyness comes from over organising our lives.

We volunteer to help friends, arrange all kinds of extra circular activities for our children, say yes to lots of wonderful invites and the result should be a full and busy life. I use the word should here ... as sometimes it is hard to get the balance right and the busy takes over. It is in these moments where it helps to remember to stop so we can enjoy our lives, our friends and make time for little pleasures.

One area where I need to stop the busy and have a little pleasure is over lunch.

If the children are home we sit down and eat together ... if not I tend to get distracted by my to do list and run round immersed in the busy forgetting to stop and recharge my batteries.

Today, I was inspired to stop. I gave myself half an hour to make and eat a simple salad and remind myself that busy is good ... to much busy ... is not.

Peel and core the pears and slice each pear in to quarters then eights

Place a frying pan on a medium heat and add the butter. Once the butter is hot and bubbling add the sugar and pears to the pan and gently stir until all the pears are covered and sugar melted.

Cook the pears for a minute or two on each side till they are soft and slightly caramelised

Remove the pears from the pan and place on top to the cheese, pour over the juices, drizzle with olive oil and serve with a crusty baguette

Cooking notes

I love Castello for this salad. If you can not find it Dolcelatte or another similar soft blue cheese will taste good. If the cheese is too sticky to crumble then just tear of pieces and dot it over the salad.

You need fairly firm pears for this recipe. They should be just to ripe to eat. If they are to ripe they will disintegrate when cooked.

Adapting

If you have a day old baguette to eat up then make some croutons to go in the salad rather than serving with a baguette.

To do this cut the bread into 1cm chunks, drizzle with olive oil and and pop them in the oven at 180 for 5-10 minutes until golden. Allow the croutons to cool slightly. Once cool, sprinkle on the salad leaves just before you add the pears.